Three federal judges questioned Mark Meadows' legal team on Friday about the push to move his election charges in Fulton County, Georgia, to federal court.
Meadows, a onetime chief of staff to former President Donald Trump, is challenging a lower court's ruling that the charges stay in Georgia. Meadows appealed before the federal Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis' office charged the former White House official with conspiring to overturn Georgia's 2020 election results earlier this summer, to which he has pleaded not guilty.
One of the tactics Meadows has employed to get a better shot in the ensuing trial is an attempt to move it from Atlanta to federal court.
He has argued that immunity laws protecting U.S. officials from prosecution "under color" of their office could apply in his case.
However, that claim was rejected by Judge Steve C. Jones of the federal District Court in Northern Georgia in September and met with skepticism from the three-judge panel on Friday.
According to Meadows, "It seems like everything was within his official duties, and that just cannot be right," Judge Robin S. Rosenbaum pressed George Terwilliger, one of Meadows' attorneys.
Terwilliger responded that his client only needed to show a connection to the duties of his federal job for the trial to be moved. It would make "no sense," he argued, to have a state judge decide on matters relating to federal law.
Judge William H. Pryor Jr., a staunch conservative, later quipped that Meadows was likely not entitled to have his case moved to federal court because he was no longer a federal official, The Guardian noted.
However, Willis' office was not free from being questioned either. The panel, specifically Pryor, aired their concerns about the precedent set if federal officials can be legally targeted after leaving office.
The looming decision will prove vital for other federal officials indicted by Willis' office, including Trump himself, in the case surrounding their alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
In total, 19 individuals, including attorneys and poll workers, were indicted in the case.